re: Mid-life crisis reality check

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So, by training, scholastically and professionally, I am an economic statistician. But I fricking hate it. Nothing I have ever done has made any difference to make the world a better place, and I am extremely frustrated.

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It’s sad that you’ve reached your 40s and still have not figured out the greatest impact you can have on the world, plus the greatest joy you can experience in life, is to get married to a good woman, start a family, and raise your children to be good, honest, productive members of society. I’m truly sorry this has happened to you.

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Mid-life crisis reality check

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Getting a 20 year old girlfriend and a convertible sounds more fun

Do it. My wife decided to go to nursing school in her mid 30's. Got her associates degree, went back eventually and got her bachelor's degree and is now a year away from earning her master's degree and becoming an NP. Been a long process with breaks between each level but it's definitely doable

Strangely enough, I had exactly the same feelings one day last week. Unfortunately, I came to the conclusion that changing careers at my stage in life would be foolish…and I am thinking that it probably would be for you as well.

I have decided to do some volunteer work in order to add more meaning to my life…though I haven’t decided what yet.

My wife went back to school and became a vet later in life, but not mid-40's late. She finished at age 38. Is already behind the ball as far student loans vs remaining working years.

Imagine yourself following this path but you are 55 when you are finished, with over $100k in student loans. The vet business is more physical than you think. On your feet all day. Repetitive stress in your wrist and hands if you do alot of the same procedures over and over. Then the emotional on top of the physical. Then the general stress of being slammed all day every day with more appt's than you have time to fully give each patient, resulting in mistakes, resulting in pissed off devastated customers who start destroying you on yelp.. and neverending staff turnover from the front desk to the vet techs. And if you need to take a random afternoon off to hit the DMV or some other appt you forgot to schedule off, tough shite you have clients booked for appt's..... the whole thing is a big nightmare. I don't recommend it. Not even to young people. Yes the world definitely needs them, but it's not in the top 100 of "wise career paths" when you break everything down. This has been my experience as a vet husband.

I would've responded to your OP with some variant of "What's the best time to make a change in your life? Yesterday. What's the next best time? Today." But then I saw this:

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veterinarian

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I researched and considered this quite a bit in the past. The insane vet school entry competition, extremely high tuition cost, low salaries, glut of graduates, high start-up costs, low billing rates, and high suicide rates are extreme reasons to proceed with caution. Add in your age and even more so reason to heed caution.

You may have to settle, like many, for fulfilling yourself outside of work with hobbies and volunteering. Maybe something parallel like volunteering at animal shelters or so on. Or find another career path much more accommodating for career changers.

That would be a bitch. Your friend is a very higher achiever, unfortunately his brother is an even higher achiever!

If I'd gone to Med school (assuming I didn't have a 2.28 in Business) and graduated, say 10th in my class, my brother would have never let me hear the end of it. That's just how he is.

He's ultra competitive, even at the few things he's not particularly good at. It seems crazy to me, but it works for him. If that fricker tells me the sky is green, I'm looking up, because I've never seen a green sky before and he's never wrong.

Previous poster said it. Very few professions make “a difference”. If that’s what you want volunteer for a worthy cause - meals on wheels, etc. In this fricked up world be thankful you have a job, health insurance, roof over your head.

Just try. My allergist as a kid was a woman who went to med school once her 4 children graduated college

She was in med school with one of her sons (which would be weird but whatever)